American Go E-Journal » World

Blackie’s International Baduk Academy (The Traveling Go Board 1/19/2013 EJ) will offer their first summer camp this June. “We hope that kids can join to our camp, but anyone is welcomed,” Kim Seung-jun tells the E-Journal. “No age or rank limit, just like in BIBA.” The camp will run June 24 through July 23 in Seoul, South Korea. In addition to helping students improve, the camp’s goals include facilitating cultural exchanges through the game of baduk (go). Highlights of the camp include game reviews and commentaries, studying life and death problems and professional games as well as games; teachers include Kim Seung-jun 9P, Diana Koszegi 1P, On So-jin 7P and Park Young-un 7d. Other activities include visiting the Hangkuk Kiwon and meeting with famous professional players, visiting the Kwon Gap Yong Baduk Academy in Seoul, as well as playing sports in a nearby park and visits to the sea. Click here for details and to register.
- photo courtesy BIBA

If regular go is getting too easy, you may want to check out the eXtreme Mindgame Challenge, which proposes to expand play to a staggering 57 x 57 board.

“The goal of this project is to make this 4000 year old game really extreme,” say the project’s organizers, who say they’re planning to recruit two teams to eight players each to play on the biggest board in the world. “Players will be quite strong so that they can focus on the whole game,” they add.

It’s not clear who’s behind the grandiose effort, which is trying to raise $5,000 for the summer 2013 project but has only attracted two supporters for a grand total of $60 thus far.

With 3,249 intersections in a 57×57 board, project organizers calculate the number of possible game positions at 10 to the 2,000 power.

Late in February, the 3rd Huang Longshi Cup kicked off, pitting the five strongest women from China, Japan, and Korea against each other.

Kim Chaeyong gave Korea a quick start, taking out Japan’s Osawa Narumi 4P and Ishii Akane 2P, as well as China’s Song Ronghui 5P and Chen Yiming 2P. However, 14-year-old Yu Zhiying 2P from China stopped Kim’s run, and added two of her own, defeating Japan’s Okuda Aya 3P and Korea’s Kim Hyelim 2P. That leaves Xie Yiin 6P and Mukai Chiaki 5P for Japan, and Yu Zhiying 2P, Li He 3P and Wang Chenxing 5P (who won 8 games in a row in last year’s tournament) for China. Korea may be in the best position with Park Jieun 9P left, as well as Choi Jung 3P and Moon Dowon 2P

Round 2 begins on April 6th. The Huang Longshi Cup is an international women’s win-and-continue team tournament between China, Japan and Korea named after Huang Longshi – a famous Chinese go genius from the Qing dynasty.Adapted from a report on Go Game Guru; click for game records and more information. Edited by Ben Williams
photo: Team Japan – from left: Mukai Chiaki, Xie Yimin and Osawa Narumi.

Youngsters from Portland, OR, took on kids from Mexico City, in a friendly match on KGS, held on Feb. 24th. The Portland group, organized by Peter Freedman, played two rounds, and won 9-5, with one tie. The Mexican group are students of Siddhartha Avila’s, at the Pipiolo elementary school, and have competed with the Portland kids before, who Avila says are “much stronger this year”. The kids video conferenced with each other before the matches, and were able to meet their opponents by Skype as well as across the board. “Some of the kids we played plan on visiting Portland before going on the Go Congress in Tacoma this summer,” reports Freedman. “They and their parents will homestay with our go families, spending a week playing go, soccer, and sightseeing with us. Our families are really revved about this idea.” Winner’s Report: Portland 2 game winners: McCaleb Nessler-Cass 16k, Jordan Reed 24k, Hikaru ?k; 1 game winners: Wilson ?k, Ellis Zehnder 23k; Mexico 2 game winners: Samuel 17k; 1 game winners: David Martinez 16k, Sebastian 20k, Yatzitl 24k. Story by Paul Barchilon, E-J Youth Editor -Photo: Students from Pipiolo competing, by Siddhartha Avila.

Park Junghwan continued Korea’s dominance of the Nongshim Cup, defeating Jiang Weijie 9P to take home the 11th Korean win in the Cup’s 14-year history.

Park was the new anchor for Korea in the team tournament, handpicked by Lee Changho himself. Jiang was a newcomer to the tournament as well.

The final round kicked off on February 26th, with Choi Cheolhan breaking his personal 8-game losing streak against Chen Yaoye. However, he lost his next game to China’s Xie He 9P.

Xie’s record at the Nongshim Cup is 2nd best in the cup’s history, and got him promoted to 9P in the first place. That left Park to face both Xie and Jiang, but he was able to pull out victories against them both and bring the Cup back to Korea after China won the tournament last year.

Sixteen-year-old Fan Tingyu 3P defeated Park Junghwan 9P on March 6th to become the youngest winner of the prestigious Ing Cup.

Fan Tingyu Left, Park Junghwan, Right

The Ing Cup, go’s longest-running international tournament, has been called the Go Olympics, since it held once every four years.

The semifinals, which took place last September, set up a showdown between Park and Fan in Singapore, where the first two games of the final were held. They left Singapore with one win apiece in the best-of-5 final.

The three final games were set for Shanghai, starting on March 4th, with Park hot off his win at the Nongshim Cup. Fan took Game Three, and the pressure was on Park, though he was playing as White, to stay in the match.

Game Four was a thriller, with Park, playing white, making a lot of territory early, with a number of weaker groups. Park ended up sacrificing two of the groups to reinforce the center. However, Fan played brilliantly to take away the center territory, with ko battles throughout the board. By the time it was all settled, black was ahead by 3 points and Fan had captured the title.

By winning the Cup, Fan not only becomes the youngest player to win the Ing Cup, but if he’s promoted to 9P, as is customary after winning an international title, he will be the youngest player to do that as well, breaking Chen Yaoye 9P’s record.

The US has won the Brunei Friendship Cup, which was held Saturday Feb. 16th, on KGS. Sponsored by the American Go Honor Society, and the Brunei I-Go Society. “The match revived an earlier tourney last held in 2010, and renewed an international friendship with countries in Southeast Asia,” reports tournament coordinator Andrew Huang. This year’s event featured two teams from Southeast Asia, a team from Canada, and a team from the United States (selected by a qualifying event the prior week). The US team featured Aaron Ye 5d, Jeremy Chiu 5d, Louie Liu 1d, Sathya Singh 1k, Jeremiah Donley 4k, Joshua Song 12k, Eric Liu 3k, Kalin Bradley 6k, and Monsoon Shrestha 8k. In the end, the Americans were victorious after posting a 3-0 record, while SE Asia Team 2 (2-1) got second, SE Asia Team 1(1-2) got third, and Canada (0-3) got fourth. “Most importantly, some international friendships were made,” reports Huang, “and very exciting games were played (including a triple ko in the qualifying event). We look forward to an even more successful event next year.” Full reports are here. -Paul Barchilon, E-J Youth Editor. Photo of Brunei players from xinwengolife.wordpress.com.

The Ing Foundation has announced its qualifier tournament for the World Youth Go Championships (WYGC), to be held March 9th and 10th. The new tournament has changed many of the requirements, added new prizes, and created a two step process. The qualifiers will be open to youth under 21, of any strength, and will be held on KGS. Two winners in each age bracket (under 16 and under 12) will be invited to compete live in Menlo Park, CA, for finals on March 22 and 23. The winner will then be invited to compete at the WYGC, which will be held in Prague, Czech Republic, this August. Another addition is the inclusion of a “special recommendation” player, who can be any youth player 3k or stronger, who is recommended by their go club, teacher, or other organization. Details on the tournament, including registration information, can be found in the attached PDF file here: WYGC. The deadline to register is March 3rd. Information on the WYGC tourney in Prague can be found here: WYGC_flyer. - Paul Barchilon, E-J Youth Editor. Photo: Tyn Church in Prague.

The Mexican Youth Go Community drew 31 pairs to their first Pair Go Tourney, held in December in Mexico City. “The kids wanted to play go with their parents but they didn’t know how, so they asked us for workshops and lessons,” reports organizer Siddhartha Avila. “Then we thought, why not make go an activity that can be enjoyed by the whole family, this way each family will spread the game even when their kids grow up and leave elementary school. We had a great response, with pairs including the kids, parents, relatives, or friends,” said Avila. Winners Report: 1st place Mariana (5th grader) and her mom; 2nd place Melanie (2nd grader) and her dad; 3rd place Diego Armando (1st grader) and his mom. A special thanks goes to the Principal Marcela Zepeda, Go teacher Marcos Arámbula and Israel Rodriguez President of Asociación Mexicana de Go, who helped us with the pairings. -Paul Barchilon, E-J Youth Editor. Report and Photo by Siddhartha Avila.